1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to an ink cartridge assembly, a kit for forming an ink cartridge assembly, and a printer, and more particularly, to an ink cartridge assembly having a plurality of interconnected ink cartridges.
2. Related Art
Japanese Unexamined Patent Appl. Pub. JP-A-2008-44257 describes an inkjet printer that prints by supplying ink from an ink cartridge to a printhead and ejecting ink from the printhead onto the print medium.
If the frequency of ink cartridge replacement is reduced, the printer can be used continuously for a longer period of time before replacing the ink cartridge. An approach includes increasing the size of the ink cartridge and increasing the ink cartridge capacity. However, designing and manufacturing a new ink cartridge with greater ink capacity also increases cost.
Another approach is to connect plural existing ink cartridges with a known ink capacity into a single integrated cartridge assembly, and install this cartridge assembly into a cartridge holder.
However, the inventors have recognized the following potential issues.
Because the outside dimensions of the ink cartridges can vary slightly, variation in the outside dimensions of the cartridge assembly can increase when plural ink cartridges are connected together, and the installation of the cartridge assembly into the cartridge holder may be difficult or even impossible.
More specifically, when plural ink cartridges are connected in series, the dimensional deviations of the individual ink cartridges accumulate in the direction in which the ink cartridges are connected, and the cumulative dimensional error in the direction in which the ink cartridges are connected can be greater than an acceptable tolerance.
In order to align the ink supply openings of the cartridge assembly with the supply needles of the cartridge holder when the cartridge assembly is installed into the cartridge holder, positioning members including a positioning hole and a positioning pin are generally disposed to the cartridge assembly and the cartridge holder. To reliably prevent the cartridge assembly and cartridge holder from shifting relative to each other, these positioning members are generally disposed to at least two places on the cartridge assembly and the cartridge holder.
However, the distance between the two positioning members (e.g., holes) disposed to the cartridge assembly may become too large or too small as a result of the cumulative dimensional error of the ink cartridges in the direction in which the ink cartridges are connected. As a result, it maybe difficult or even impossible to fit the positioning holes in the cartridge assembly onto the positioning pins disposed to the cartridge holder. If the size of the positioning holes is increased to accommodate this cumulative dimensional error, the connection between the enlarged positioning holes and the respective positioning pins may become loose.